Releasing the Commons: Rethinking the futures of the commons (Routledge Studies in Human Geography) - Hardcover

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1138942340 ISBN 13: 9781138942349

Publisher: Routledge, 2016

Synopsis

This book moves beyond seeing the commons in the past tense, an entity passed over from the public into the private, to reimagine the commons as a process, a contest of force, a reconstitution, and a site of convening practices. It highlights new spaces of gathering opening up, such as the digital commons, and new practices of being in common, such as community economies and solidarity networks. The commons is seen as a contested domain of the collective and as a changing way of being in common, with the balance poised in the tensile play between political economy and social innovation. The book focuses on the possibility of recovering a future in which more can be held by the many, focusing on three concepts: nation and nature as a commons, publics and rights, and bodies, concerning the management of lives and livelihoods. Across these three passage points, the book finds evidence of a commons under attack but also defended in fragile though promising ways.

With contributions from leading scholars, this thought provoking book will be of great interest to students and scholars in geography, environmental studies, politics, anthropology, and cultural studies.

About this title

About the Author

Ash Amin is Professor of Geography in the Department of Geography at the University of Cambridge, UK.

Philip Howell is Senior Lecturer in the Department of Geography at the University of Cambridge, UK.

Edition details

• Publisher: Routledge
• Publication date: 2016
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1138942340
• ISBN 13: 9781138942349
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 226
• Editor: Amin Ash, Howell Philip